


The first time

by imsfire



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Angst, Backstory, Canon Backstory, Cassian-centric, Child Soldier, Gen, OC (an Imperial soldier), Tumblr Prompt, and then one day realising, and trying to deal with that, killing without thinking about the implications, that when you kill you end a life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-01
Updated: 2017-07-01
Packaged: 2018-11-22 02:46:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11370987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imsfire/pseuds/imsfire
Summary: A common ‘trooper in shiny white; he had to be taken out, and it was another easy hit, another blow struck for the cause.





	The first time

The first rock he threw at six; the first bottle-bomb half a year later.  By then Cassian Andor was running messages as well, and ferrying goods, mysterious lumpy parcels that sometimes rattled and sometimes were soft and strangely lightweight for their size.  He fetched and carried for the local separatist cell, the partisans, and anyone else who would work with them.  He didn’t know what was in the packages.  If he was told it was something he ought to carry then he carried it.  It was for the rebellion.  He was doing the right thing and that was all he needed to know.  In the street battles he ran ammo supplies to the men and women hunkered down behind walls, and threw the rocks, and the bottles with their lit-rags-and-benzene, when and where he was told.  _Provide a distraction, little Cassian, give us some cover while we make a break for it…_

The first time he fired a gun, he was nine.  He’d been fetching and loading weapons for others for a while by then but everyone said he was too little to use one for himself.  He didn’t want to be too little; but getting big was a problem.  He couldn’t get much to eat, the fighters took the best stuff for themselves and now that mama was dead there was no-one to look out for him.  He looked out for himself when he could; but stealing from another rebel meant hurting the cause, not helping it.  He was small for his age and skinny, everyone said so. 

He hefted the blaster someone had given him for a laugh at the end of training, and fired.  It was still loaded.  The shot went wild, a live ammo bolt wasted on the snow.  _Hey, watch out, little Cassian, come on, you’re too small for that kind of thing…_

He couldn’t build himself up by eating protein and working out in the gym to exciting music, the way the heroes of holo-novelas did.  He went running, swam in the icy bay each summer, climbed ropes and trees and walls, shouldered the heaviest pack and stood in the front of the line unloading arms deliveries.  Volunteered for every duty roster, every request for back-up; stood night watch time after time when others looked for ways out of it.  He stayed small and skinny for another three years and then suddenly shot up; when the growth spurt finished he was still thin as a bone but a healthy five-ten.  Shoulders that had been narrow and sloping became hard, corded with wiry muscle; hands that had been boyish even when callused from work became veined and powerful, and suddenly no-one noticed the bitten fingernails, only the strong hands of a youth halfway to manhood. _Huh, you’re not such a little pip anymore, are you, kid?  Here, hold this for a moment; you ever fire one of these?_

He was twelve.  He fired a gun, hit a target.  Fired a gun, scared a ‘trooper, missing the white armour by a bare inch ( _scared him shitless, you’re more than a distraction now!_ ). 

Fired a gun, sent a man flying off a stationary speeder, rolling on the ground shrieking and clutching his leg.  Three fellow soldiers gathering round to help while a string of partisans snuck out of their hiding place behind, unseen.

Fired a gun and killed a man. 

It was better than the stones and bottles; they’d honed his aim, and now he was strong enough to hold a real weapon and use it.  ‘Troopers in their white gear were shiny as bugs and as loathsome.  Cassian became a sniper, picking off whatever target he was set-to, casual as he might have stepped on the snow-white grain beetles they resembled so much.  It was so easy.  It was the right thing to do.

The first time he didn’t see a bug when he fired, he was fourteen, and eight years a fighter. 

It was a simple mission; a fenced compound, a watch-tower, an observer on guard.  Supplies of food and ammo for the taking, if they could just break in unseen.  Cassian on a rooftop would take out the guard and provide cover while his comrades cut the wire and took the goods.  A common ‘trooper in shiny white; and it was a spring day, the grey-blue sky setting the target off perfectly.  He had to be taken out, and it was another easy hit, another blow struck for the cause.  Another dead beetle. 

He lay on his belly on flat cold slate, lining up the shot, then watching his chrono, waiting for the signal.

The man fidgeted; fidgeted constantly.  Switched his gun strap from side to side, shifted his weight from one foot to the other, flexed his shoulders, stretched surreptitiously.  Cassian kept having to adjust his aim.  Again, and again, and again. 

He began to mutter swearwords under his breath.   _Come off it, you son of a pig, not again!  Stop twitching for the hells’ sakes, let me keep my shot, ah come **on** , you kriffing asshole…_

The man looked all around carefully, fidgeted, looked a second time as if double-checking there was no-one coming; and took his helmet off.  Set it down on the parapet, pulled off one plated glove as well, and stood still at last, massaging the back of his neck.  Through the gunsight Cassian could see him working his fingers into the muscle. 

Not a grown man at all, but a youth not much older than himself. 

He saw brown eyes and a head of cropped black hair, a thin pale face, a wide mouth.  An ordinary face, neither handsome nor dull, a face one would greet in the street, buy groceries from, or kaf, or gasoline.

The timer buzzed, pressed against his hip.  A glance down showed him the rest of the team in place, ready to run to the fence as soon as they were unobserved. 

On the tower, the boy was pushing his lips forward, letting out a long breath and perhaps a groan of relief at the pleasure of rubbing his sore neck.  Cassian blinked once, twice, and took the shot. 

Red blossomed in the dark hair, and out of the wide-lipped mouth.  Splashed onto the snowy armour.  A perfect kill-shot; the boy fell without a sound.

He stayed in place till the raid was done, then slid down off the roof and made his way to the rendezvous.  He’d been in position three hours, barely moving.  His neck was stiff.

A man could die, massaging an aching neck, and never know what he’d done to deserve it. 

_I wonder who that boy was, where he came from, why he joined up?_

It wasn’t about deserving; it wasn’t personal.  He had to be taken out.  It was the right thing to do.

_It was the right thing to do._

_Everything I do, I do for the rebellion._

_It was the right thing to do._

**Author's Note:**

> For the prompt "First time" from tumblr thefulcrumcaptain.


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